Cameron (warmthinthedark) wrote in summerview, @ 2019-03-18 19:48:00 |
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Entry tags: | cameron lakota, complete, player: mj, zkanuna oliver |
How long do you have?
While he still wasn't quite settled in with the idea of staying in Summerview, for now, Kanuna had no plans for leaving, and definitely not without Samuel. Since Samuel seemed to enjoy his job at the tattoo parlor and had made friends with Clara, it appeared this was where Kanuna would stay for the time being. Summerview had its charms that other cities didn't, such as a social network that was safe to talk on and be open about what you were. Sort of a supernatural facebook. With it, Kanuna had talked to some interesting people and one of those interesting people he was meeting up with tonight.
Cameron seemed pretty engaging and Kanuna was dying to see what he looked like. Consider him petty all you want, Kanuna did like to ogle pretty men. He "borrowed" one of Sam's nice shirts while his friend was at work. It was a black long sleeve button up that was left three buttons undone at the top to show off his assortment of necklaces, paired with his own jeans that weren't too worn yet, and his trusty old boots. Cameron hadn't flinched away from calling it a date, so that was what Kanuna was going to treat it as - including hoping Cameron was going to pay, because he was a little down this week on funds and was too proud to ask Sam for a loan. The asker of the outing was usually the buyer, right? He'd arrived at the Long Way Down, his favorite in Summerview so far, and waited at the bar with a view to the door, watching each person who came in for someone who might be Cameron. He sipped on his dark beer and used his nose, sniffing for someone who smelled like someone he'd not yet encountered on the island. Someone with good hands, by the sound of things. A professional masseuse? Hell yes. Cameron in all honesty was relieved that he seemed to be connecting with the people in Summerview as this was where his mother came from and maybe if he could get to know the town then by extension he might be able to get to know his mother. It was a long shot and he was aware of that but it was better than nothing. He was clad in jeans, ones that hugged his hips like a second skin, a dark t-shirt and long navy coat accented by bracelets and rings and belatedly as he stepped through into the Long Way Down he realised he didn't actually know what Kanuna looked like. Cameron turned his head and searched the faces of all those gathered to see if he could figure out who Kanuna was. Kanuna saw Cameron come in among the other faces and noted that this one looked around as though looking for someone. He watched him, thinking he’d just found the one he was waiting on, taking the opportunity while the other man was searching to look him over. Well damn, if this was him, Kanuna was very glad he’d agreed to this. A professional masseuse and attractive? This was his lucky day. He waited for Cameron to make eye contact with him, then raised an eyebrow and nodded to the stool next to him at the bar. It didn't take long to clock the person he was supposed to meet given the guy with the long hair and all the decorative necklaces given him the raised eyebrow was any indication. "Hey," he drawled with a friendly smile as he approached and slid onto the stool next to Kanuna. "You must be Kanuna," he said before offering his hand. "Cameron." "Hey yourself," Kanuna returned, clasping his hand with Cameron's and unable to resist the urge to make his a slightly more dominating one - though it was subtle. "That's me. Nice to meet you in person, Cameron. I gotta say," he chuckled and ran a hand through his hair, grayish eyes mapping the lines of Cameron's face, "I didn't expect you to be remotely attractive." Cameron had noticed the way Kanuna’s hand tightened around his and made a mental note for future reference. “No?” He asked before turning to order himself a drink. “And whatever he’s drinking.” A tilt of his head towards Kanuna had the bartender looking at the other. “What were you expecting out of curiosity?” Kanuna asked for whatever beer was on tap and smiled at Cameron."Thanks," he nodded. "What was I expecting? Ahh, let's see." There was a chuckle and Kanuna puffed out a breath from his lips. "Masseuse who does his own side work and comes to town advertising that? Probably an old man, someone with a physical deformity, maybe. Bald, definitely. Nice hands, sure, but probably shorter than average and needs a stool to reach the massage table." He smirked and stole another look at Cameron. Cameron tipped his head back to let loose a warm laugh before he flicked his tongue over his lower lip, teeth catching there as he just shook his head. “Wow, just wow. And yet you still offered to meet me, you must be really interested in my story.” Kanuna laughed and shrugged his shoulders. "What can I say? I'm philanthropic like that. And it sounded like you had a good story to tell." Their drinks arrived and Kanuna took a sip of his, letting the foam tickle his nose. "So," he said after a moment and turned in his stool so he was facing Cameron more. "You start. What brought you here?" Cameron inhaled and exhaled, trying to figure out how to start. The when wasn’t the difficult part after all. He picked up his drink and sipped the warm brown liquor that burned the back of his throat. “I came looking for my birth mother.” "Was she missing?" Kanuna propped an elbow on the bar and scooped up his beer, watching Cameron attentively. If this was going to be a long story, he wanted to catch the details of the man's facial expressions and be careful not to make it more than he was willing to share. Cameron pulled in a breath as he flicked his tongue over his lower lip before he worried it with his teeth. His brows even drew together, struggling to work out how to express the thoughts whirring in his head into words. "Not exactly," he managed as he rolled the amber liquid around in the glass itself. "I never even knew her." "Why not?" He pressed again. There were several possibilities. The man could've been abandoned by his mother, or stolen. Maybe got lost in an amusement park and never claimed. Birth mother could've been a surrogate. Kanuna had lost his own mother at a young age thanks to cancer, and had been raised for the next few years by his father, who was also lost to him before Kanuna left his teenage years. He knew the importance of family and knew those sort of ties could drive people to seek them out. “Abandoned,” Cameron shared as bluntly as Kanuna had pressed. “As a baby.” He knocked his drink back and gestured for another. “Put into the system and was lucky enough to be fostered and then eventually adopted by my parents.” "Huh. That's rough, man." He nodded sympathetically. "How'd you find out your birth mother was here?" Cameron wasn’t looking for pity or sympathy as it was just cold hard facts. Things could have been a lot worse for him. “Well finding out anything about her took about five years and then I spent the last two years in Atlantic city before a friend of hers recognised something about me and approached.” He couldn’t help but wonder if maybe he’d been more successful in his search then his mother might still be alive. “Pointed me in this direction and to where my mother could be found. Rocked up and found myself stood at her grave.” "Oh." Kanuna went still and studied Cameron's face. He didn't seem too distraught by this, the discovery of his mother being dead, but it was hard to tell in a crowded bar with someone he'd just met. "Shit. I'm sorry." He took a sip from his beer. "What are you going to do now?" Cameron was keeping his expression schooled into something pretty unreadable because he didn’t know how he felt about it. Not really. He hadn’t even known her after all but she’d taken a lot to her grave including information about his past. “I’m not sure,” he admitted with a rueful smile . “I figure my mom was from here so maybe just maybe there’s somebody here or some kind of records that I can access. "That's a good idea!" Kanuna nodded enthusiastically. "And there are residents here who've been here since the town was built. If your mom lived here, chances are they'll know her." “Kinda what I was betting on,” Cameron admitted with a smirk. “But that is my very long story.” He picked up his new drink and tipped his head to look at Kanuna expectantly. Kanuna was confused for a moment by the expectancy in Cameron's regard, and then remembered that they'd agreed to swap story for story. "Oh right," he nodded. "My name." Downing the rest of the beer and setting the slightly foamy glass aside, he cocked his head and laced his fingers together on his lap. "Alright, so," finding a place to start was always the hardest part. "What do you know about the Cherokee, first of all?" Although Cameron looked vaguely native, it didn't mean he was or had been brought up in their culture. Especially not likely after hearing Cameron's story. Cameron was a little bit amused by the sudden change in Kanuna’s posture including the folding of hands in his lap. “Uh I’m gonna be honest with you a whole lot of nothing.” He had his mother’s last name which was Lakota which he’d been told was indicative of some native heritage but his adoptive parents had been white so he’d never really explored it in much detail. "Alright. Safe answer." He laughed. "I can respect that." Most people had at least seen Disney's Pocahontas or had watched an old Cowboys vs. Indians Western. It was safer to leave the stereotypes at the door and Kanuna appreciated Cameron for it. Shifting a bit on the stool, Kanuna did a quick glance around the room and inhaled, just out of habit of being aware of his surroundings. "Animals have a special significance in most Native American tribes, and the Cherokee are no exception. I won't get into all the nitty gritty details, but animals can be seen as signs or omens or sometimes appear in dreams as messengers from other beings or from our ancestors. Different animals can mean different things." He tapped his forefingers against one another. "Like an owl or a cougar, very important in Cherokee beliefs. They were the only ones to stay awake during the creation, so they saw it all. My father was named after the white owl - Onacona. My mother, she was named after a butterfly - Kamama." He waved his hand in a slow sweep. "Waaaay more graceful names than Bullfrog, right?" Cameron was quiet for Kanuna’s explanation, the interest he had in the answer was clear in the way his gaze held Kanuna in its regard and didn’t drift. The way people in his tribe were named was pretty beautiful and the culture was something Cameron imagined you needed to live in order to fully understand. “Um, yep.” A nod given. “Definitely more graceful than Bullfrog.” "Well see that's the thing," Kanuna tapped one side of his temple and grinned slyly at Cameron. "They say a bullfrog can call the rains. And who can survive without rain? Not butterflies. Not owls." He tipped his beer as though he'd just proven a point. "You could say I'm necessary for life." "Well at least your parents gave you a name with actual meaning," Cameron remarked with a bemused smile as he picked up his glass and took a sip. "I think my folks just thumbed through a book and blindly chose the first one that sounded good." "That just gives you a chance to create your own meaning for it," Kanuna pointed out, giving Cameron a nudge on the arm with a smile. "Some people would kill to not be stigmatized by a name right out of the gate. The first question I usually get when I introduce my self is "oh, where are you from?" because it's not a white European colonizer's name." He smirked and shrugged, sipping from his beer. “Mm you do have a point there.” Cameron tended go get that as well but in a different way given that both of his adoptive parents where white and he was distinctively not. Thankfully they’d always been honest with him so he’d been able to answer quite confidently. “So what more is there to your story?” Shrugging, Kanuna gave a short chuckle. “Depends on how much more you want to know, really. I could go on about Cherokee stories involving bullfrogs if you like.” He cocked his head at Cameron quizzically. “Or did you mean the story of more than just my name?” Cameron snorted quietly. "I was going more for the story of more than just your name considering I laid out my own dramatic history." He finished off his drink and ordered another because well he didn't really get as drunk as he probably should have considering he wasn't built like a brickhouse but then he ran hot so in a way he burned the alcohol off. He tipped his head. "So, is there anything more?" "Ah," Kanuna laughed again and shrugged. "I am more than just my name, but not a whole lot more. Let's see..." He was focused on his glass now, unsure where to begin or what to say about himself that wasn't self-depreciating or would scare Cameron away. Shaking his hair from his face, Kanuna looked up at the shelves of liquor behind the bar and smiled. "Ahh, I grew up on the reservation and kinda left without a plan. I've been homeless for the past, oh, five years? Just traveling around. The old, "me and my guitar" schtick." He smirked and took a sip of the beer. Cameron frowned a little when Kanuna admitted to being homeless for the last five years. He’d been lucky in the way that he’d never had to worry about a roof over his head or food in his stomach but he knew that not everybody had that. “That’s rough,” he offered quietly. “What made you leave the reservation?” Kanuna looked down at his drink and was quiet for a long time while he debated how to answer that question. Before coming here, he would've just laughed and attributed it to wanting to see new places, explore a little. But now that he was at this point, where he stood after having come clean to Samuel, he wasn't sure he could keep on lying in his answer. There was no way to move past his guilt if he never admitted to having done wrong. Finally, Kanuna looked at Cameron with a sad and serious expression. "I... accidentally turned my best friend into a werewolf. Staying didn't feel right after that." Cameron could tell that whatever had caused Kanuna to leave his home must have been pretty serious given the sudden change in the other. Gone was the lightness and was instead replaced by a heavy thick feeling of... something. And then it all made sense as Kanuna finally looked at him and gave his answer. Well, fuck. He turned away only briefly but just so he could order himself and Kanuna something a little stronger as it felt appropriate. “That would definitely do it,” he affirmed as he offered the new drink to Kanuna. Kanuna thought Cameron might leave after he told him the truth, that maybe he'd even get some judgement from the man - which he felt he justly deserved. But instead, he was surprised and a little confused when Cameron stuck around and even bought them another round. He felt a brief touch of hope and studied Cameron as he took the new drink, one that would certainly go down easier after their conversation took a serious turn. "That doesn't worry you at all?" He queried, hope cautious in his mind. "That I'm someone who can turn against a friend?" “You used the word accidentally which indicates to me that you didn’t mean to do what you did and things got away from you,” Cameron pointed out. “I mean if you’d turned around and said that you’d planned it and actually you had no remorse over the action which from your expression alone I can tell that you have then yeah that would worry me.” He collected up his drink and took a sip, studying Kanuna over the rim. “And between you me I once set the family cat’s tail on fire and that traumatised the shit out of the poor thing but it was an accident so my family understood that. Long story short to answer your question? I’m good.” Kanuna wore a vulnerable expression as Cameron explained his perspective. He knew his remorse over his slip of control that night, his blind anger that had turned his eyes from the livestock to the man guarding them, would haunt him forever and would always leave him wracked with guilt. But to have someone so easily look past that and, not rationalize it, but to forgive it without even knowing all the details, that made the five year long ache in Kanuna's heart ease just a tiny bit. He couldn't help the smile that transformed his expression from serious and vulnerable back into companionable at the cat story. "If you're good, I'm good." He chuckled and tapped his glass to Cameron's in toast before taking a sip of his own. |